T
here has always been an ongoing romance between art and Chelsea. The Chelsea Hotel, one of Manhattan's few bohemian hot spots, maintains its existence as a famous landmark inhabited by artists, writers, and musicians. At various times, it was home to William S. Burroughs, Dylan Thomas, Janis Joplin, and Sid Vicious. The hotel on West 23rd Street continues to be a place for artistic convergence. The lobby looks like a nostalgic art museum. From sculptures seemingly suspended in mid-air to paintings exhibited in all thoroughfares, the artistic ambiance perpetuates the past.
Earliest residents include Charles Melville Dewey in 1885, Rufus Zogbaum, an artist who later covered the Spanish-American War for Harper's Magazine, and Henry Abbey, a theatrical producer. The Chelsea has been visited by actresses Sarah Bernhardt and Lillian Russell and the writers Mark Twain and 0 Henry in 1907. Suzanne La Follette, an early feminist who wrote on conservative issues, spent many years living at the Chelsea Hotel writing and editing magazines such as The Nation, The American Mercury and The Freeman. She also wrote several books including Concerning Women, which came
out in 1926 and pressed for the civil rights of women, and Art in America, a 1929 work that traced American artistic development from Colonial times.
In the 1930s, Thomas Wolfe wrote You Can't Go Home Again at the hotel. Artist John Sloan lived there and Edgar Lee Masters made it his permanent home. Dylan Thomas and Brendan Behan also came to the Chelsea. James T. Farrell and Nelson Algren passed through as well. Andy Warhol filmed Chelsea Girls there. And it was at the Chelsea Hotel that Arthur C. Clarke and Stanley Kubrick wrote the screenplay for 2001: A Space Odyssey.